Contents

Club
career

Tommy Coyne played for Hillwood Boys Club before starting his
professional career at Clydebank, where he made his debut in
the 1981-2 season, in which he scored 9 goals in 31 matches. After
scoring 19 in 38 matches in his second season, he began the 1983-4
season with 10 goals in 11 games before being sold to Dundee
United, then a rising force in Scottish football as part of the
New
Firm, for £60,000.

However, Coyne failed to reproduce his form at Tannadice and
scored only 9 goals in 62 games, though he did score a few goals in
the UEFA
Cup. Halfway through the 1986-7 season he was transferred to
city rivals Dundee,
where he found his scoring boots again, notching up 9 goals in 20
games in the second half of the season. In the 1987-8 season Coyne
was top scorer in the Premier Division as he scored 33 goals in 43
matches. After scoring 9 goals in 20 matches at the start of the
1988-9 season he was sold on to Celtic.

Coyne again failed to reproduce his form at the start of his
Celtic career and did not score for the remainder of the season.
The following season was also hardly a success, with 7 goals in 23
games. The next season, 1990-1 saw Coyne revert to his previous
form with 18 goals in 26 games, as he finished the season as top
scorer. Despite scoring 15 goals in the following season and 3 in
10 games at the start of the 1992-3 season, Coyne was transferred
to Tranmere Rovers in March 1993.

After a short spell in England, Coyne returned to Scotland to
join Motherwell in November 1993 for
£125,000. In 1994-5 he was again the Scottish Premier Division's
top scorer, and scored 59 goals in 132 games for Motherwell.

Tommy Coyne is the only player to be Scottish Premier division
top scorer with three different clubs.

Coyne left for Dundee in 1998, where he was loaned out to Falkirk. He then
returned to his first club, Clydebank, as player/manager in August
2000[1] and
picked up the Scottish
Second Division Manager of the Month award a month later.[2]
However, he was sacked after six months after the club had entered
administration[3] despite
the club being near the top of Division Two.
Soon after leaving Clydebank he joined Albion
Rovers,[4] where
he ended his playing career. His son, also named Tommy is also a
striker and currently plays for Albion Rovers.

International career

In his international career, Coyne won 22 caps and scored 6 goals. He made his
international debut on March 25, 1992 against Switzerland in a friendly played at Lansdowne Road,
Dublin. This game would also
be the international debut for Eddie McGoldrick and would be Paul McGrath's fiftieth cap.
Coyne would have to wait just 27 minutes before scoring his first
international goal. He was replaced by John Aldridge in the eightieth minute,
who would convert from the penalty spot to make it a 2–1 victory
for the Republic. Coyne started three of Ireland's
four matches in the 1994 World Cup[5] but he
failed to score in the tournament. His best game for Ireland was
the 4–0 victory over Liechtenstein on
October 12 1994, played at Lansdowne Road. Coyne would score two
goals in the opening four minutes of the game but failed to achieve
his hat trick. He would
play his last game for the Republic, coming on as a substitute for
David
Connolly, in the one all draw with Belgium on October 29,
1997. The game was the first leg of a playoff for qualification for
the 1998World Cup, Belgium would win the
second leg 2–1 and ultimately qualify for the 1998 World Cup.